by Maya Rios, staff reporter

In preparation for this post, I relied on the multitude of recipes that come through my Facebook feed; the winner was a s’more cheesecake cupcake recipe from ‘Twisted’. However, I soon learned that converting gram measurements into cups is extremely difficult. So I found a similar recipe on ‘All-Recipes’: a cake-sized s’more cheesecake. The recipe called for similar ingredients and had similar instructions that were simple and fun but very messy.

I’m known as the decent cook in the family, but I’d never made a cheesecake before. The preparation does take some time because you have to crush the graham crackers to make the crumbly crust and mix the cream cheese (which can be extremely messy if you don’t use a large bowl). The recipe called for chocolate cream cheese, but I couldn’t find any in my local grocery store, so I just used regular unflavored cream cheese, which turned out fine. Also, I did not have a 9-inch round pan that the recipe called for, so I used a dinner pan, which seemed to work okay.

There are certain steps that should be added into the preparation of the cheesecake, such as freezing the crust and allowing the cake to cool in the oven. My marshmallows were a little too toasty and my crust was too crumbly to cut an even piece from the pan, but we didn’t mind because in my family we don’t like the crust that much anyways.

THE RECIPE:

2 cups graham cracker crumbs

1/3 cup butter, melted

3 (250 g) packages chocolate brick cream cheese, softened

3/4 cup white sugar

3 eggs

3 cups miniature marshmallows, divided

2 teaspoons milk

2 tablespoons semi-sweet chocolate chips

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2.  Mix graham crumbs and butter; press onto bottom and 1-1/2 inches up side of 9-inch springform pan.
3. Beat cream cheese and sugar in large bowl with mixer until blended. Add eggs, 1 at a time, mixing on low speed after each just until blended; pour into crust.
4. Bake 40 to 45 minutes or until center is almost set. Run knife around rim of pan to loosen cake. Refrigerate cheesecake 4 hours.
5. Heat broiler. Microwave 1 cup marshmallows and milk in microwaveable bowl on HIGH 1 minute or until marshmallows are completely melted and mixture is well blended, stirring every 30 seconds. Spread onto cheesecake. Top with remaining marshmallows; broil, 6 inches from heat, 1 minute or until golden brown. Cool 10 minutes before removing rim of pan. Garnish with chocolate chips.